Kanagawa, 6 January 2014 The Journal of Cleaner Production asks for papers on achieving absolute reductions in material throughput and energy use in society. A “deep change in the way we produce and consume” is necessary, they write. This would include changes in the economic system and in culture and lifestyles. A critical challenge for humanity is to bring society’s consumption of materials and energy, and its generation of wastes, within ecological limits and to do this quickly enough to avoid serious irreversible damage to the planet’s life-supporting systems.

The papers will be used for a Special Volume of the Journal of Cleaner Production, to be published in 2015,  and a policy report and synthesis, identifying key approaches to reductions, current knowledge, and knowledge gaps.

The Institute for Global Environmental Strategies, the Global Research Forum for Sustainable Production and Consumption, the World Resources Forum, and the Wuppertal Institute are running an exploratory project on REDUCTIONS “Reducing Environmental Degradation & Unsustainable Consumption Trends & Impacts On Nature & Society: Research, Policy and Practice”.

The project aims to identify, describe and analyze approaches to reduction in material throughput and energy use in production-consumption systems. It further aims to demonstrate reduction possibilities and highlight effective characteristics and implementation mechanisms of reduction policies and practices. With the Call for Papers the REDUCTIONS consortium wishes to engage with other researchers who share an interest in exploring approaches to global downscaling of anthropogenic material throughput.

Deadline for submitting abstracts (400-500 words) is January 30, 2014. Information: Lewis Akenji (akenji@iges.or.jp).

Authors may also contact the ‘Editor-in-Chief’ of the Journal of Cleaner Production: professor dr. Donald Huisingh, University of Tennessee, USA. E-mail: donaldhuisingh@comcast.net 

Download here the full text of the Call for Papers (pdf).